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Revista Panamericana de Salud Pública

On-line version ISSN 1680-5348Print version ISSN 1020-4989

Abstract

PUENTES-MARKIDES, Cristina; MAIESE, Deborah and GRANTHON, Myriam.Healthy People in Healthy Communities: the vision of Health for All in the United States of America for 2000-2010. Rev Panam Salud Publica [online]. 1999, vol.6, n.6, pp.430-433.
ISSN 1680-5348. http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1020-49891999001100014.

For the first decade of the new millennium, "Healthy People 2010" will be the official designation of the health promotion and disease prevention policy of the United States of America. The policy's work plan carries on the vision of Health for All that is promoted by the World Health Organization and the Pan American Health Organization and whose attainment will be the responsibility of each and every person on earth. Healthy People in Healthy Communities, as the approach to Healthy People 2010 will be called, will have two general objectives for the United States as a whole. One is to increase the years of healthy life, incorporating the concept of quality of life into that of healthy life expectancy. The second objective is to eliminate health disparities. Twenty-eight priority areas and more than 400 goals will be consolidated through community initiatives and close communication among the public, health authorities, and community leaders. The experience of the United States is particularly interesting because it is participatory, as shown by the creation and consolidation of alliances between numerous sectors, bipartisan political support, use of scientific tests to support decisions, and efforts to strengthen data collection processes. The broad acceptance and adoption of the objectives of Healthy People by practically all fifty states reaffirms the initiative's validity in various socioeconomic and cultural contexts. Healthy People 2010 will be launched publicly during a conference that will be held in Washington, D.C., from 24 to 28 January 2000, with support from the Healthy People Consortium and the Partnerships for Networked Consumer Health Information.